WSJ Only Major Newspaper to Increase Circulation in Last 6 Months

The latest audited circulation report for the newspaper industry is out, and while it’s not exactly pretty, it’s not entirely bloody, either.

Overall, circulation for newspapers in the U.S. declined 5 percent during the six months ended Sept. 30, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations’ Fas-Fax, the industry’s semi-annual scorecard released on Monday.

Last fall, 282 newspaper reported e-editions in their weekday average totaling 1,577,732. By contrast, for the same period this year, 445 newspapers reported e-editions in their weekday — totaling 2,314,815, for a roughly 47 percent increase in e-editions, according to an ABC rep.

The Wall Street Journal has by far the biggest electronic circulation, with nearly 450,000 getting an electronic version of the paper. The Detroit Free Press is a distant second (about 100,000), with the New York Times (71,697) third in terms of e-circ.

Meanwhile, the Journal was the only major American newspaper to increase its circulation — up 1.82 percent. (The Dallas Morning News — up 0.25 percent — was essentially flat.)